The Department of Justice (DOJ), the lead agency that oversees the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), has mandated that many municipalities and other governmental bodies comply with certain regulations regarding accessibility. One such regulation deals with accessibility on walkways in public right of ways. In brief, it requires that surfaces of those walkways enable tactile detection by visually impaired persons. One of the primary ways of providing the ability to detect proximity to hazardous locations (e.g., roadways, railroad crossing, etc.) is by modifying the surface texture of the walkways. Detectable warnings are distinctive surface patterns of domes detectable by cane or underfoot, and are used to alert people with vision impairments of their approach to streets and hazardous drop-offs. The ADA Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG) require these warnings on the surface of curb ramps, which remove a tactile cue otherwise provided by curb faces, and at other areas where pedestrian ways blend with vehicular ways. They are also required along the edges of boarding platforms in transit facilities and the perimeter of reflecting pools.
Complying with the federal mandate is requiring the expenditure of much time and money by the municipalities to modify the surface textures of their sidewalks and other walkways.
Several devices currently exist for creating a dimpling in the surface texture of walkways detectable by the visually impaired. Domes are forms of dimpling that can be created in the surface of concrete or asphalt walkways while the material is in its plastic state (moldable state) to provide notice to pedestrians that they are approaching a hazardous location. The problem, however, is that the devices currently available to produce domed surfaces in concrete are inadequate to the task. They do not provide an efficient reliable means of producing uniformly textured surfaces compliant with the regulations. Uniformity in the surface texturing is vital to a visually impaired person's ability to distinguish a warning surface from a normal walking surface.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for a device and method to efficiently and reliably create the uniform doming of hazardous warning surfaces so as to enable more rapid and cost-effective compliance with the regulations, thereby creating safer walkway conditions for the visually impaired.